Texas Architect - November/December 2012: Redevelopment

This issue on the theme of “Redevelopment” exploits the multiple dimensions of the term, which routinely implies not only physical change, but overall change for the better. Along with new structure, redevelopment often occasions new uses, new energy, new life — a welcome revitalization. In some cases, there is even a kind of redevelopment — and an accompanying invigoration — that results more from a remix of uses than from physical change.

Studio Awards
2012 Studio Awards
This year’s Texas Architects Studio Awards jury
convened at the offices of AIA Atlanta August 14
and selected five projects as winners from a pool of
60 entries. All colleagues in Atlanta, the jurors were
Tony Ames, FAIA, of Anthony Ames Architect; John
R. Stephenson, AIA, of Richard Wittschiebe Hand;
and Christopher Welty, AIA, of Southern Polytechnic
State University Department of Architecture.
Presented here are all five winners from this year’s
program, which annually recognizes excellence in unbuilt, often strictly conceptual, architectural design.
FED_Scraper
HKS, Inc., Dallas
This fantastical concept, created as an entry
in the eVolo 2012 Skyscraper Competition,
emerged from the following premise stated in
the submission: “That government transforms
the way we occupy and inhabit space is nowhere
more geodetically relevant than in the United
States capital of Washington DC, where limits
have reached capacity in both physical space and
organizational structure. Never before has the
government owned more enclosed space within
the U.S. than in the present where an increase in
subsidiary agencies has led to an explosive acquisition of government land leading to exponential
sprawl reaching outward into the neighboring
states.”
The design response, in opposition to
“these grand edifices that break apart the fine
meshwork needed for a city to thrive,” seeks to
“congregate Federal program within a sub-grade
metropolis, burying the program beneath whilst
activating the ground plane.” As a result, “Walls
become the physical limits of unrivaled growth.
DC is given back in large swaths of land to the
people, where previous federal land within is
returned to the citizens to re-inhabit.”
Jury Sound Bites:
it’s the intriguing kind of project that keeps people
thinking about things ... the type of imaginative
exercise we should try to encourage or we’re going
to lose the ability to do it ... the idea of giving back
to the people is compelling ... the spaces are very
intriguing and seductive ... places to experience ... a
sort of blade-runner type of realm ... we applaud it for
its sheer creativity
11/12 2012
Texas Architect 21